senorsucks2suck

Cinematic games should go the way of the Dodo bird. There was a point where consumers and developers were chasing graphics. I'll arbitrarily pick the year 2011 as being a reasonable inflection point where consumers were sufficiently amazed by what was to come and developers were actually achieving something, visually. Since then we have pretty much gotten rounder wheels on racing cars (to use Jeff's favorite phrase followed by someone, probably Ben, saying something about sweating cars... and we have a whole bit).

I don't come to games for graphics anymore, haven't for a very long time. Uncharted 4 is just this cardboard cutout facade of game about as impressive as taking the train through NYC with only what's visible through the window actually existing, and even then it's just a prop. I could pick apart a movie in the same way saying: that scene was clearly shot in new mexico and not egypt. But i don't. Movies are short, comprehensive, and aren't a 4th or 5th recipient of a game of telephone (with the 6th being a committee and 7th bean counters.. because the visionaries are rarely talented 'enough' prograamers #doublefine) for the delivery of human emotion the way videogames are. Videogames should honestly stick to what they've done in arcades since the beginning and what games like Fortnite, Rainbow, and PUBG are doing... sticking to plain facts of tight game mechanics. Movies and Cinema deliver me to places and worlds that i could never be. Being in movie paris can NEVER be equivocated with videogame paris no matter if you use RTX or render 1,000 instagram photos, sorry! Cartoons deliver recognizable (most importantly) caricatures of real life that keep them relatable. Videogames? Meh!

World building games like Fornite and PUBG are the way videogames can deliver narrative. It's called a wiki. Let me play your game. Experience your unique mechanic and leave the auteurship to movie directors. Fail states, fetch quests, and length justifying price have made videogames just boring. I play them because they're a cheap enough return on an investment and a gateway to new music, visual spectacle, and pretty much the best way to smart tv your tv. It's why i drink soda instead of water, it's just enhances bland and very familiar substance with a little difference here and there (new watermelon mountain dew folks) but nothing replaces water. In this case water is the games i already know and love from the ps2/360 era (2011).

I remember when ps3 had a harddrive i thought that i could finally play an entire game of fifa whatever and have the game recorded and i could go back to it and watch it. I never did. Some of the game highlights (in cinematic mode) in the post game wrap up was all i needed. I wasn't playing but i did all of that. Seeing it presented cinematically was kind of like the perfect thing. Of course games miss the point. Instead of presenting my game back to me in its entirety with maybe a little flair maybe a little prescience with knowledge of the future i could watch a cinematic version of the entire game i played with commercials and maybe a little Hannah Storm commentary. Make my loss to Aston Villa something worth watching (2016, 2017, and 2018 fifa story mode puts cinematics of gaming in their place). Of course games don't do that. Games can't do that. But for some reason they keep trying while im F*^%$-ing playing! Hitman is kind of the only game to get cinematic and games right. Let's see what Hitman 3 can do. I can walk out of 2.5 hour viewing of Inception a changed man. Playing through the cinematic waddling of the entire Uncharted series is a whole lotta nada. Quantum Break and it's live action is the BEST way for games to do cinema.

I'll be getting a Series X. I am highly invested in the Xbox ecosystem. Getting a Series X means that I can pass on my One-X to a buddy of mine for free because it will help foster gaming between us. With system link being a known quantity across multiple generations it will be nice to maybe go on a road trip and system link some Halo or Gears on a snowboarding trip (in case it's the worst snowboarding trip and we resort to playing videogames). Their last gen controllers will work. Current gen controllers will work. There's a wealth of 360 games with co-op and system link that even the most gamer of gamers hasn't explored solo let alone in co-op or system linked.

Besides, I think Game Pass will be the veritable dumping ground for every game that ever was at some point. Find the balance between leaving your legacy games full price on every other marketplace (it's not worth the time to fiddle with price point) and negotiate with Microsoft for gamepass compensation. Let your games get played and build up a following. Hype your next release.

For me I won't be staying in the gamepass universe for long. It is nice to have exposure to tons of games but I've got enough stray games on disc laying around that I could stock a bar on new years eve (any year other than 2020) without even mentioning my digital collection and the assault on time that free epic games and ubisoft games are doing to my future free time.

I can't get down with Sony's 20 hour game business model. Though i would like a PS5 the physical system design is too try-hard and at $400-$500 it's not competitive. Looking at PS4 prices are still out of control and I'll pick up a PS4 Pro when the new-in-box price is $199. I'll be able to catch most if not all of PS5s first few years of releases since they aren't doing much new besides whatever Ratchet is doing, which to me seems just like it could be done with art direction on a PS4.

Cinematic feels like an outright farce. I'm from the Arcade era so to me cinematic means the arbitrary as hell fail states of Dragon's Lair. As arbitrary as my parents were at the time. There is zero emotional resonance for me in digital characters. If it's from anything it's from the voice acting combination with the visual. A cartoon can get tears from me but a game? Never if ever. I think it might have everything to do with multiple fail states so when someone dies i'm trying to reload and persevere through. Character arcs take way too many hours for me to care. So unless i mainline a game in a day I'm just not caring about party members. Now when Donald gets mercked in Fire Emblem i feel for him and will restart as many times as it takes to save him. Sometimes i just move on.

I'll admit when God of War on PS2 had me quicktiming my way to badass-ery I was very much into it. Now the only cinematic I want to see is the opening cutscenes and maybe transitional cutscenes. If you're going to walk and talk me then color me bored. I do appreciate the Gears of War chime where they mark bullcrap is now over and prepare to do more than lean the movement stick forward aka gameplay is starting up again. One day there will be a checkbox that says do you no longer want quicktime events. Tomb Raider has the option to remove all the mashery and stick rotating inanity, or at least to tone it down. Go one step further. Quicktime seems like the era of gaming similar to when cartoon were doing a Matrix parody but doing their own take on it (few and far between finally, games take notice... please). Now we are in the Quicksilver moving faster than other characters in your space spoofing in cartoons.

Games REFUSE to move away from quicktime. It's Sony's bread and butter. When they announced Miles Morales and showcased a bridge scene and they quicktimed me all of my hype for next gen (i mean what did i want.. games need to evolve but can't) deflated and I started saying to myself that alot of administrative B.S. will be cleaned up like load times and delivering only single player or multiplayer components. But as far as new? NOpe!

@theoracleofgame: DF is the altruistic good guy in all this. This is their moment. Can't wait to see Jon on Ellen. Breaks my heart too.

@frytup: There is no wandering. Thesis is: DF "reporting" is the genesis of all this. This is an edge case where their efforts mattered. I'd say it's alot of water wet and this game could be better. DF it's pacman.. give it a rest.

@frytup: Not going to take the bait which is a thing from the new Monster Hunter movie. But i think the internet has agreed that we aren't watching that right now. Mods probably won't ban you since you're on the 'right' side of the argument.

@colourful_hippie: I'm not clever enough to do satire. DF is interesting and has merit but much like the rest of youtube it's a niche that doesn't need niching. There videos are nice for 20 minutes of technical jargon just so i know my widgets from my whatzits, but we didnt need them in the previous (however many) generations and now their services are essential? I don't think so. People regurgitate talking points about crunch or better graphics or who wore it best (i mean ran it best). Crunch happens in every industry and when you show up late at the grocery store and just need a minute.. you are forcing crunch. It's the nature of employment. But get a few pics of developers sleeping under their desk and it's anarchy. I slept at the library while going to school. My professor should have done something. My mo should write a letter.

@raven10: Sony wants you to embrace their all digital PS5. If they don't do something like this then people will be reluctant to buy anything digitally going forward. CD Projekt tried to pull a fast one and we need the middle man to have our backs. They are doing that here. I'm most interested in the timeline and price for the game when it comes back. They can't say "and now DLC is free," because they already promised DLC for free. PS5 version were free as well. I think we are going to get alot of comes free with Witcher 3 + all DLC on Playstation when we see it again. That may get me to buy it there if i secure a PS5 or Series X any time soon.

@the_nubster: It's truly another case of Digital Foundry telling you that you aren't having fun. I kind of think that they are the ultimate trolls. I enjoyed their pre next-gen console insight and hearing them breakdown what these consoles could do was great. At this point they do more harm than good and i'm definitely am unsubscribing. Negative Nancy here to tell you that sidequest mission was actually at 1078.9p and you should feel like it's a hate crime. DF to me is like that meme video from the journalist that couldn't figure out how to play Doom and was just bad at the game.